The incredibly lucid Avedon puts it this way:

The real issues in this case involve both harassment and the refusal of the Republican leadership to deal with it, but also the fact that Foley got a law passed making his online activities illegal. Understand this: If Foley had sex with a 17-year-old in Washington, DC, that wasn’t breaking a law, because the age of consent in DC is 16. However, the federal law Foley created made it illegal to have sexual online contact with anyone under 18, and that’s the principle criminal issue.

Breaking a Federal law that you yourself wrote—Is that carrying self-hatred to new, unheard of heights, or what?

And it couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of closeted fascist fucks.

NOTE So, the sooner these guys get out of the closet, the better for all of us. The return of the repressed is one thing when it happens on your shrink’s couch, but quite another thing when it drives public policy and consumes all the oxygen on the airwaves.